First Holy Communion (reflections)

[I_am_not_mafia]

But isn't it odd that, this day and age, masses of people attribute special holy powers to ordinary water? Seriously, its just water. And it takes a bit of imagination to consider it otherwise.

The only thing that differentiates it from "normal" water as that it has been blessed by a priest. So what? That brings up my next issue: blessing. At one point during the ceremony, the priest talked about these little plaques that were given to each of the participants commemorating their first holy communion. Fine. But then he added that he had personally "blessed" each one. What good does it do to "bless" something? This is starting to sound less like reality and more like D&D. It's all fine and good that if (while carrying the plaque) my nephew were to receive a +1 bonus to his saving throws, but there is absolutely no evidence that anything remotely like that is the case. However, I'm sure that "blessing" holds a real meaning for many that were in the church that day. If you pressed a believer to give an explanation for what a blessing practically does, I'm guessing you'd either get a shrug or a convoluted explanation that resembles the saving throws concept.

A bit like homoeopathy. It's the idea that something can leave a memory on a collection of H2O atoms which then has an effect. I remember in my late teens when I was in a D&D group. Unfortunately it became infected with christianity via the DM to everyone else. It's like the opposite of the Jack Chick tract, but whereas the DM started preaching instead of giving us cool Satanic spells once we reached level 8 (which I incidentally need to remind my current DM now I am a level 8 halfling assassin).

Anyway one memory I have is that we were out on the way to a meet up and went to pick someone up in the car. One the group decided to bless the house and then started worrying afterwards that maybe he shouldn't have because it was only supposed to be church leaders doing that. I mean what did he think actually happened when he physically touched some concrete and said a few words? It really was like seeing some people take their D&D too seriously and start believing in magic in real life. And this is one reason why the function of woo is to give people the illusion of control over a noisy and unpredictable world. The closest similarity is with people who do actually believe that they are practising magick, such as from the traditions of the Golden Dawn or Wicca.

What I did like was the homily. The priest talked about cultivating love within oneself, not only for family and close ones, but also for strangers. This seems like a good idea to me. I have reservations about equating love with Jesus or advising one to express love to an imaginary being. But where else (outside of religious institutions) do people intentionally and meditatively cultivate love within themselves? Hippies do it, I guess. But otherwise this sort of thing is only practiced in a religious context.

Now I have the image in my mind of a group of naked women in church chanting and getting to know their rose buds